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Monster outburst/Panic Attack in the school definitely wasn't as bad as that Hare scene IMO. I can understand trauma from deep, forgotten memories (as cliched as it is), but what the heck were you trying to pull there with Hare, Shu? That was really pathetic when all he did was push her away so far.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the reason I'm mixed on Shu is because his patheticness was pushed from realistic to artificial in this episode. The Hare scene was just low (and as someone noted, the animation was off during the scene), but it was a little tolerable. However anytime Inori was mentioned, Shu became unlikeable (I don't think I have to say why). There's a difference between grief and Oscar-baiting, especially when a girl with no personality is involved.

Edit: It wasn't as annoying as I thought it was going to be though, so I don't regard Shu's state as a flaw in the episode.

Finally, an episode that delivered a series of eventful singularities in chain reaction that made me look to all sides. A serious flaw, however, was listening to Shu wallowing in self-pity over his trauma with Jun's incident. It's getting on my nerves now every time he goes emo mode and puts on his most depressed quitter, victim attitude.

Ok. Enough of that rambunctious campiness, let's cut chase.

What we have here is likely an elaborated plot conspired possibly between Keido, his enigmatic boy-sponsor, and Dr. Segai (Joker) possibly being Keido's partner-&-enforcer in all this entangled scheme.

Spoiler:

What is established and hinted speculating that ten years prior to the main storyline, Keido activated the meteorite triggering the Apocalypse Virus pandemic seen first during the Lost Christmas incident.
1. It's still left unanswered whether the first time was deliberate or came as an accident during making out tests on the meteorite. However, what's concrete is that Keido became dazzled and marked by such experience, thus his reaction for craving to see the full ending to the Lost Christmas now that he's activated the meteorite the second time around.
2. (Speculation) It's likely that Kurosu Ouma attempted to stop Keido either before or while Lost Christmas was taking place and shutting down the meteorite, prompting Keido to kill Kurosu Ouma. However, Professor Ouma probably safeguarded some last secret from Keido; well, that's what I tend to think.

Both Gais' and, more accentuated, Shus' flashbacks with each passing episode are becoming repetitive featuring the same girl.

This is the same girl from Gai's past, and, most likely, he meant her as the girl serving his motivation to fight for in this episode.

This same girl had a fraternal and close relationship with Shu as a kid ten years ago; this same girl bears some striking resemblance to Inori in the physical aspects, and she fell victim to the Apocalypse Virus.

Now, speculating while joining the dots:
- Inori became the most affected by the song, and she cries out that person's going to awake; I speculate that someone else served as either a receptacle or receiver when that song was used first during Lost Christmas.

- Speculating, Inori is not a normal human by any accounts, or at least, a human who did not have either a normal upbringing or normal birth. Keido's reaction reads without a doubt that he knows who or what Inori's truly is, and, moreover, he anticipated all along the day she would cross paths with Shu; Keido also knowing Shu succeeded the Void Genom.

- Inori has been with Gai for as along as she can recall. He helped her, gave her a shelter, a place, and a life to fight for.

- My theory. Inori might or not be a clone or a genetically-manufactured faux body likely or not for a certain character. This character could be that same girl from both Shu and Gais' memories. That same girl played an unwilling role at the onset of the Lost Christmas, possibly having some connection to the song now being used for a second time that activated the meteorite.

One nice touch: Inori actually considers the possibility she is a monster. That says a lot right there, imho; a normal person would still be pissed to be *called* a monster but wouldn't stop to think "am I, perhaps, actually a monster?"

Anyone want to place bets on that other blond kid having one of the other void genomes?

The biggest open mystery is, imho, what happened to Shu's memories. Looks like Haruka will fill him in in a few episodes, she seems to know the scoop.

Episode was pretty good except the parts with Shu. Especially causing Inori's song to shatter then calling her a monster and my goodness that Hare scene. I do like the direction the plot is going though.

Anyway...wow. That was a major development. I honestly didn't expect things to pick up so fast this time; everything's coming into a clearer view than before.

So apparently, Keido was involved in the Lost Christmas incident, apparently to demonstrate what the meteorite thing could do and now he wants to finish what he started. And Shu and Gai do share some history there, as their flashbacks suggest.

It was fun watching Segai this episode, and they've finally brought out Kenji Kido. And that blond kid from Episode 6...

Other than that, I was very annoyed by Shu during this episode; seeing him reduced to a pathetic, spineless adhgahdgssjk, especially that scene with Hare. And him calling Inori a monster...

I'll give this one 8/10, 'cause thanks to this episode, I finally have a more solid motivation to continue watching. (Angry Dan, and things aren't looking good for Funeral Parlor).

I never got the feeling he was talking to Inori when he shouted Monster! It felt like he was making a comment about his delusions or whatever. On an aside to that -- I think the reason this is no normal trauma is that the current situation of seeing Jun has brought back his old memories of the events of Lost Christmas where presumably a lot more people had rapid spreading of the cancer right before his eyes.

Kinda like a PTSD Vietnam vet having a "recurrence".

Ayase probably wore the uniform, because kids are expected to be in school during the day, so if she were just wandering around in regular clothes it might draw attention.

That being said, I think I see what the writers are trying to accomplish with him, it's just that the execution could probably be a fair bit better.

In fairness to Shu, he seems to have some variation of post-traumatic stress disorder. I haven't studied that psychological condition in a long time, but Shu's handling of it is not entirely atypical from what I can remember about it. More severe cases of the condition will have people seeing traumatizing things that aren't really there, and freaking out over it. Soldiers with it will imagine that they're back fighting the last war that they were in, and will see imaginary gunmen trying to take them out. Given enough "shocks to the system" through such psychologically jarring episodes, people can go into a defensive (if not outright reclusive) shell and become a bit surly.

That being said, that's not all that is going on here with Shu, as it doesn't really explain his regrettable treatment of Hare.

Guilty Crown's writers are using Shu as a central locus for character drama. In other words, they're using his actions and words as a means to heighten drama, emotions, and tension throughout the rest of the character cast.

There is a positive here. Hare, Gai, and Ayase all had great moments precisely because Shu gave them legit reasons to get pissed off and critique him/stand up for themselves. Hare in particular had a wonderful moment near the end of this episode, one that helps to round her character out even more (more on that later on).

The problem is that while this can help the characterization and development of other characters, it does make Shu much less likable, at least for many viewers. It's most definitely a double-edged sword, and probably not the wisest approach to take with your lead protagonist. That being said, I at least see the method behind the madness, and so I won't weigh it too heavily against this episode.

Now, as I wrote before, I loved all the other characters in this episode. Segai was at his villainous best. Gai, Ayase, and Hare all had great moments as I mentioned before.

As much as I really like Hare, there have been times in recent episodes where I felt she had become perhaps a bit too submissive towards Shu. As such, it was great to see her stand up for herself here. The way Shu approached her near the end really was pretty skeevy and disrespectful, and he deserved to be called out on it. It is good that Shu is at least not romantically dense, but this is obviously no way to act on the realization that a girl you're friends with loves you romantically.

Now, as for the plot, the raid to take the plane was very exciting to watch, and struck me as pretty realistic for this show. Maybe one of the good things about Shu quitting on Undertaker is that it forced the writing staff to not Void/Super Power their way through things, so the action side of things had to come a bit more down to Earth, making it a bit more gritty I felt.

At a directorial level, I loved how certain shots were framed, particularly facial close-ups at key moments. That really added a lot of "Oomph!" to certain key moments, and made everything simply crackle with an earnest exuberant energy.

The plot thickened nicely in this episode, as some revelations were made but even more mysteries arose to take their place. I don't mind an air of mystery surrounding everything as long as that's accompanied by a steady flow of answers and/or revelations, so I'm very happy with this overall approach.

Overall, this was a very fun and enthralling watch. Shu did make me sigh a couple times and drag down an otherwise outstanding episode for me.

As such, I give it 9/10. A very good episode to kick off Guilty Crown getting an Anime Suki subforum!

I'm still holding to expecting Shu to turn a semi-permanent corner by Ep13. This is classic end-of-first-cour climax approaching for the plot and development for Shu.

Who knows, judging by how Gai was looking at the end of the episode, he may just kick the bucket by the end of Ep12 with a reluctant Shu taking over as leader of Funeral Parlor for him. Except not trying to be/replace Gai, but instead be his own kind of leader.

What I found surprising is that they actually just sent Shu out on a mission without even working on any issues he might have first. I get they are in a hurry here, but that was seriously a stupid move. They should know Shu well enough by now to at least check things out before putting him in a prime position in a serious mission. Was kind of blinking in surprise since I knew right at the start everything would go to hell.

Can't blame Ayase for pushing him since that's how she deals with things. Sadly Shu couldn't describe what was really scaring him and no one was really asking either. Everyone just went into their corners and things turned out like this.

Gai definitely seems to be running out of time here. If this mission wasn't looking bad enough he was needing more and more treatments to stay on top. If they are going for a swap with him going out and Shu stepping up it's going to happen soon.

Anyways now things are going crazy. Can't believe those guys are actually going to unleash the stone like that. It also proves that Haruka didn't realize much of anything. Didn't connect Inori to that girl (other than a superficial level), that he had the void genome, or that he was connected to the Undertakers.

Nice slap though by Hare. Hope Shu bounces back soon since they really hit him with his worst moments right here.

That being said, I think I see what the writers are trying to accomplish with him

yeah i suspect the writers were trying to say, shu was trying to be like gai but hes not hes Shu. So when trying to be someone he's not crashed and burned, he is gonna realize that he can only be himself. So hopefully after this up we start to see him do things his way and become the badass everyone wants him to be.

the ep did put alot of pieces together, atm i am left with 4
1. Why is Shu the only character with memory loss
2. What is the virus and origin of lost xmas
3. Who the hell is the new kid who looks similar to the boy from shu's memory fighting with the girl.
4. Who or what is Inori and that girl from the past

Damn, what an episode. The experience with Jun affected Shu much more than I expected and even hindered directly his ability to pull voids. Plus those creppy flashbacks, poor guy.

And poor Inori too, all she could do after the sudden rejection was cry and walk away. On the bright side the obvious was confirmed and her being in love with Shu as well brings the true potential of the genome one step closer to being released. Just a little step more...

Then Keido and Segai putting their "justasplanned" face and starting the second Lost Christmas upon Funeral Parlor, GHQ and the entire city. Waiting for next week will be truly painful (because the preview clearly always omits the best scenes).

Not quite: Shu doesn't mess up missions and make everything worse. Shu does, without even meaning to.

OK, now how do we go about with this set-up? Shu is again back to square one. With everything in a mess and the links still a blur I think the next set of episodes would involve Shu piecing everything together.

I can't believe it took until the third page for somebody to mention PTSD. Shu got mindfucked by the visions Jun gave him last episode and he killed the kid whom he promised to protect, of course he would suffer a breakdown.

Things are looking up for the Shu haters though. We're at the halfway point, and after this Shu has nowhere to go but up... assuming the writers aren't sadistic like those of NGE.

Let us start here from Square one. No... from zero.
Back in my day, you had to come up with your own trolls instead of posting an image macro! You kids have it easy! Avatar/Sig courtesy of TheEroKing
Guild Wars 2 SN: ArchonWing.9480 MyAnimeList || Reviews

However, it's important to keep in mind that a male character can be good without being manly, and a manly character isn't necessarily a good character.

Indeed. Otherwise the best character would be this guy Protip: Don't watch MD Geist

Eva is one of my favorite anime even though our lead there wasn't that much of a man. (But I felt he did fairly good for what he was given; it's not like anyone knew what the fuck they were doing in that )

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Let us start here from Square one. No... from zero.
Back in my day, you had to come up with your own trolls instead of posting an image macro! You kids have it easy! Avatar/Sig courtesy of TheEroKing
Guild Wars 2 SN: ArchonWing.9480 MyAnimeList || Reviews

However, it's important to keep in mind that a male character can be good without being manly, and a manly character isn't necessarily a good character.

True, but being manly gives you a far better chance of being likable than being a wimp. Just ask Dan Eagleman, the pinnacle of manliness in this show. Although judging by the conclusion, he won't have very long. Don't leave us with just Scarface as the only funny character you morons.